Direct Bodily Empathy — Sound, Signal, Feedback
04 Apr - 11 Oct 2026
Direct Bodily Empathy – Sound, Signal, Feedback explores sound as a material force of consequence in the world. Through audible currents and felt vibrations, sirens and noise, deep listening is used as a means of knowledge building and a tool for critically engaging with a planet in crisis.
Spanning the Len Lye Centre, Aotearoa and international artists and collectives examine sonic relationalities and the politics of sound through a range of approaches. These include acoustic ecologies, where sound becomes a speculative tool for sensing and indexing biodiversity and climate volatility; concepts of ‘ear witnessing’, where audio material acts as legal evidence; and sound as a decolonial force, where musical composition unsettles acoustic histories while affirming Indigenous ways of being and knowing.
Staging sonic encounters, artists harness more-than-human co-performers, such as the wind, decomposing fruit, and native birdsong, to amplify the voices of weather systems, sonify carbon flows, and attune with the dawn chorus. Others compose warning sirens as harbingers of ecological feedback loops, or turn up the volume on ancestral rhythms to live by.
Through sound installations and sculptural assemblages, field recordings and experimental films, musical composition and archival interventions, lecture performances and deep listening experiences, the exhibition asks: What does a healthy ecosystem sound like? How can sound act as a decolonial gesture? What are the techno-politics of machine listening? What sirens and warnings are needed to survive the future?
Direct Bodily Empathy is a two-part exhibition series curated to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Len Lye Centre. The exhibition’s title pays homage to Len Lye’s notion of ‘bodily empathy’, a term that signals an attunement with the senses, or the transfer of elemental energies. While Sensing Sound amplified artists’ intentions through sonic structures, resonant objects, and shared vibration, Sound, Signal, Feedback asks: What can sound do? Here, alongside Len Lye, contemporary artists employ material sound for the transmission of meaning and as an input for action.
Key Dates
June 27:
Exhibition opening celebration and participatory public programmes and events
October 3:
Publication launch with Perimeter Editions
Stay tuned via our website and social media for more details.
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Aura Satz, Sirening (as a verb), 2026. Still from multi-channel video installation HD and 16mm, duration variable. © and courtesy the artist, London
Aura Satz, Sirening (as a verb), 2026. Still from multi-channel video installation HD and 16mm, duration variable. © and courtesy the artist, London
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Aura Satz, Sirening (as a verb), 2026. Still from multi-channel video installation HD and 16mm, duration variable. © and courtesy the artist, London
Aura Satz, Sirening (as a verb), 2026. Still from multi-channel video installation HD and 16mm, duration variable. © and courtesy the artist, London
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Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Walled Unwalled, 2018. single channel video installation, duration 20 mins and 4 secs. © Lawrence Abu Hamdan, courtesy Maureen Paley, London
Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Walled Unwalled, 2018. single channel video installation, duration 20 mins and 4 secs. © Lawrence Abu Hamdan, courtesy Maureen Paley, London
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Yuko Mohri, Decomposition, 2022. Fruit, speaker, cable, wood, computer, dimensions variable. Installation view in Art & New Ecology, The 5th Floor, Tokyo, 2022. Image: Naoki Takehisa. courtesy of the artist, Project Fulfill Art Space, mother’s tankstation, Yutaka Kikutake Gallery, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, WHITE SPACE
Yuko Mohri, Decomposition, 2022. Fruit, speaker, cable, wood, computer, dimensions variable. Installation view in Art & New Ecology, The 5th Floor, Tokyo, 2022. Image: Naoki Takehisa. courtesy of the artist, Project Fulfill Art Space, mother’s tankstation, Yutaka Kikutake Gallery, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, WHITE SPACE
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Len Lye, Particles in Space, 1979. 4’, 16mm, b&w, sound. courtesy of the Len Lye Foundation. Digital version by Park Road Post Production and Weta Digital Ltd from material preserved and made available by Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision
Len Lye, Particles in Space, 1979. 4’, 16mm, b&w, sound. courtesy of the Len Lye Foundation. Digital version by Park Road Post Production and Weta Digital Ltd from material preserved and made available by Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision
